


A Drinking Contest

by Mengde



Category: Aladdin - All Media Types
Genre: F/M, Gen, Humor
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-06-12
Updated: 2012-06-12
Packaged: 2017-11-07 14:28:09
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,252
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/432160
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mengde/pseuds/Mengde
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When Aladdin says he's more useful than Razoul and the royal guards combined, Razoul calls him to make good on his boasting... by beating him at a drinking contest! It's a story of unlikely coincidences, awkward moments, and alcohol. What's not to like?</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Drinking Contest

It had been five minutes since anything had happened last. The two combatants sat across from each other, one in an untenable position. It was a sumptuous room in the Palace, filled with cushions, chairs, and tables loaded down with food, that played host to their epic battle.

Strangely enough, the other occupants – Palace servants and some visiting dignitaries who were taking the morning to relax – failed entirely to notice the conflict, despite its grandness of scale.

Carpet did the equivalent of crossing its arms, which involved folding its top two corners across one another and flicking its tassels a bit. It obviously had no eyes, but it did its best to give its opponent a penetrating stare.

Genie felt the stare. "I'm thinking, I'm thinking! Gimme another minute, rug-man!"

It really was funny, he reflected. Semi-phenomenal, nearly-cosmic powers, and he couldn't beat the rug at a game of chess. He was in check three different ways and no matter how he stared he couldn't figure a way out. The only reason they were still playing was because Carpet hadn't declared checkmate yet, so there had to be one way out of this that Genie wasn't seeing.

The game had, so far, lasted fourteen turns.

It was a new record. Carpet usually beat Genie in ten or eleven; he'd never lasted this long before. He really was desperate to win, but no matter how he stared at the board nothing came to him.

The rug started tapping one of its lower tassels against the floor.

"Fine!" Genie said, exasperated. He randomly grabbed his queen and moved it two squares to the left out of apathy.

Carpet stared at the queen, then at Genie, then at the queen again. It threw up its tassels in surprise and then extended one in what was clearly meant to be a handshake.

Genie accepted the shake cautiously, not sure what was going on. A realization dawned on him then, like a sunrise on a plain that had been eternally black and lightless. "I won? I actually won?"

Doing its best interpretation of a laugh, Carpet shook its "head" and checkmated Genie.

He stared at the chessboard again and then said, "You were congratulating me on a new record, weren't you?"

The rug gave a vigorous nod.

With a sigh, Genie vanished the chessboard in a puff of smoke and sat back in his chair. "Oh, well. Someday. Not like we don't have forever, right?"

Carpet agreed with him and then turned around when the door to the room they were in banged open. The rest of the people in the room looked as well, then went back to their breakfasts and various discussions after seeing that the person at the door was in no condition to give or receive cheerful greetings.

Aladdin, looking bleary and unkempt, stumbled over to where Genie and Carpet were sitting and collapsed into a chair next to them.

"Good to see you up, Al," Genie said brightly.

Aladdin winced; to him, Genie's greeting had sounded something like " _ **GOOD TO SEE YOU UP, AL!**_ "

"Please," Aladdin whispered. "Quiet. My head is killing me."

" _ **FIGURES IT WOULD BE!**_ "

"Quieter. If you could. Please."

" _ **I'M PRACTICALLY WHISPERING HERE!**_ "

"Actually would be preferable. Vastly."

Genie eyed his friend with some concern and conjured up a goblet of water for him to drink. "This'll help," he said in a voice so quiet that crickets might have mistaken it for silence and started chirping. "With the dehydration."

Aladdin took the goblet and quaffed it, then sat back and rubbed at his temples. "Can't you… y'know, zap me?"

"That's a good one, Al," Genie whispered. "You know that genies can't kill, make people fall in love, bring people back from the dead, or cure hangovers."

"You never mentioned that one before!"

"You didn't strike me as the drinking kind. I didn't think it was really necessary."

"Ugh." Aladdin sat farther back in his chair and kept rubbing at his temples. "I feel just awful. What exactly happened last night?"

Genie and Carpet exchanged a look of what could only be pure joy.

"You don't remember?" Genie asked.

"Nothing. It's all fuzzy and weird around the edges."

"Story-time!" Genie exclaimed gleefully. "Once upon a time –"

He shut up when Carpet clamped a tassel over his mouth and made a "wait-a-moment" gesture, then flew off and out the door.

A minute later, the rug returned with a very thick book. It dropped it on the table with a dull _thud_ that made Aladdin cringe.

"What's this?" Genie asked.

The rug opened the book and pointed to what it had written there, which came as a great surprise to Genie and Aladdin, who had obviously never known that Carpet could write.

It read: _Carpet's Diary._

"You keep a _diary_?" Aladdin muttered.

Carpet turned the page. The next one read: _Because what else am I going to do when everyone else is asleep and not wanting to go flying?_

"Good point," the young prince-to-be conceded. "You made a diary entry about what happened last night?"

In response, Carpet flicked through the pages until it got towards the latter half of the book and then thrust the manuscript at Genie to read.

Genie conjured up a pair of reading glasses for himself and inspected the text. "November the Seventeenth. I played one of Genie's games today, something called croquet. It was relatively simple in theory, but he managed to end his turn with a spectacular breakdown – namely, punting his ball through the roof of the farthest Palace tower." He looked accusingly at his tasseled companion. "I thought there was a fly there!"

Carpet made a dismissive gesture and turned the page again.

"November the Eighteenth. A most interesting day, the events of which I will relate presently and at length. It involved a challenge of personal honor, many pints of fine ale, and happenings late into the evening that were so embarrassing that I would hesitate to commit their memory to paper were it not for the immense potential they bear for extortion."

Both Genie and Aladdin looked at Carpet as though seeing the rug in an entirely new light. "Are you some kind of criminal mastermind?" Aladdin asked.

Carpet raised its tassels triumphantly in the air and started doing its very best impression of a victorious cackle.

* * *

The rug's diary entry was very illuminating as to what precisely had gone on the previous day, but it was also full of commentary on the nihilistic qualities of existence and rather disturbing analyses of the frailty of non-weave-based life-forms. In the interests of adroitness and clarity, the happenings of the previous day will be related from an omniscient perspective, so as to more clearly present all that happened, as well as to avoid Carpet's oft-disconcerting musings about how textiles, though they are vulnerable to scissors, do not have to worry about bleeding to death if cut.

There was also a rather risqué ode to one of Princess Jasmine's throw rugs, which will also be omitted because it is simply unsettling.

* * *

The day began as usual, with the exception that nothing unusual happened. More often than not there was some great menace rearing its ugly head, but that particular November the Eighteenth was a placid, calm day with nothing interesting going on at all.

It was at about noontime that things started happening. Aladdin and Jasmine were enjoying the tranquility of the day and having lunch in the royal gardens, which was also the place that Genie was challenging Carpet to a rematch at croquet. He had just managed to give the Sultan's quarters an extra, ball-sized window when Razoul, followed by a pair of his royal guardsmen, ran into the garden, shouting that they were under attack. He was very noticeably devoid of his turban.

Aladdin and Jasmine exchanged a weary glance, disappointed that the day's peace was apparently at an end. "Who's attacking?" Aladdin demanded. "Mechanicles? Mozenrath? Or have the Odiferans been tricked by the imps into starting another war with us?"

"You'd think after the first time they would have learned," Jasmine sighed.

"None of the above!" Razoul exclaimed, eyes wide. "Whatever it is, it is a pernicious and powerful foe! It attacks from range with small, wooden balls at speed, capable of punching through stone! One of them came straight through the wall of the guard post and took my turban out the other side with it!"

Aladdin and Jasmine stared at the frazzled guardsman for a long moment and then looked at Genie and Carpet. Razoul, puzzled, followed their gaze, just in time to see Genie delicately give the nearby fountain a new spout.

"You mean… it was… _him_?" Razoul managed.

"Looks that way," Aladdin said, sitting back down and returning to his lunch. "Sorry, Razoul. False alarm."

"You need to keep a tighter leash on that genie!" Razoul thundered. "What he's doing is dangerous, and if he is distracting us at a crucial moment, it could mean disaster!"

Aladdin raised an eyebrow. "A 'crucial moment?' Since when have you guys actually done anything _useful_ around here? I'm the one who always ends up going out and fighting all the undead in the Land of the Black Sand or foiling some crazy scheme that Mirage concocts involving a giant, black, phallic object and lots of mirrors. You really aren't that necessary."

Razoul bristled. "Say that to my face, street rat! We of the Royal Guards have protected the royal palace and the royal family for generations! And without the help of a genie or a magic carpet, on top of that!"

"Fine, I'll say it to your face," Aladdin retorted hotly, getting to his feet. Jasmine opened her mouth to warn him off but was a second too slow. " _You're not necessary._ " She closed her eyes and put her palms to her face; this was only going to end in tears.

"You may enjoy the Sultan's patronage and the Princess's favor," Razoul growled, "but that's not going to stop me from putting you in your place! I've never backed down from a challenge, to say nothing of one so insulting! We will settle this by a contest of men! If I win, you will admit that you are in error and we of the Royal Guard are crucial to the security of the palace and the city, and you will call me Captain from here on out. If you win, I will never call you street rat again and I will even take orders from you. Are we agreed?"

"Fine," Aladdin laughed. "What contest do you want to try to take me on in, Razoul? Swords? A race? Acrobatics?"

Razoul blew an especially irreverent raspberry. "Please. I said a contest of _men_. We will settle this in the old-fashioned way: a drinking contest!"

The grin slipped right off Aladdin's face. "A drinking what?"

* * *

It should be noted that Aladdin had never partaken in any serious drinking, ever. He had as much tolerance for alcohol as Iago had for Abu (none). The one time he had experimented with a bit of fine wine, he had ended up on the Palace roof, trying to cut his hair with Jasmine's shoes.

Razoul, while no longer young, had been the Agrabanian equivalent of a wild frat boy in his youth. It was not accurate to say that when at a party he drank a lot of alcohol. He did not drink it so much as he inhaled it, and it was not so much a lot as it was enough to kill a Mamluk, who due to shoddy construction usually end up with multiple livers.

Aladdin stood a total of no chance.

* * *

"You don't have any idea how to get out of this?" Aladdin asked Jasmine, somewhat desperately.

"Not any way that wouldn't involve you backing down and admitting you were wrong or otherwise looking like an incompetent oaf in front of Razoul," Jasmine replied sweetly.

Aladdin ran a hand through his hair and bit his lower lip. "I can't drink, and there's no way out of it. Fine. Maybe there's some way I can cheat."

"You're going to consider cheating at a drinking contest you got yourself into?"

"No other way to win, and I have to win. No way I'm calling him Captain and admitting he was right!"

Jasmine sighed and took another sip of tea. "Leave me out of it, then. I don't want anything more to do with a drinking contest."

Aladdin arched an eyebrow at her. " _More_ to do? What?"

"One night, some of the servant girls and I were bored and decided to see how drunk we could get off of the Palace's stock of royal wine. I woke up the next day with a splitting headache and two of the servants in my bed."

Putting on his best grin, Aladdin said, "Maybe you could tell me mo-"

"No."

* * *

"And that's the story," Aladdin finished. "Anything you can think of at all?"

Iago took a moment to contemplatively rub his beak. "Hmm. Nah. If Jafar ever had any potions or anything like that to keep him from getting drunk, he never used 'em. Of course, he only got drunk once in a while, when he was depressed about how badly his bid for the kingdom was going."

Silence reigned in the very late vizier's chamber, which was lined with arcane books and many alchemical vials containing substances that looked somewhere between deadly and fatal. This was news to Aladdin. "Jafar actually had… _feelings_?"

"Oh, yeah. Well, sort of." Iago smoothed some of his feathers and continued, "First he would get drunk and rant about what a buffoon the Sultan was. Then he would get really drunk and start hitting me with that snake staff of his, or at least trying to – I'm pretty sure he was seeing double by that point so his aim wasn't good – and yelling about what a lame sidekick I was. Then he would get ultra-drunk and apologize to me for trying to hit me, and then he would start talking about how beautiful Jasmine is."

Aladdin's gut did a triple acrobatic flip. "You're _joking_."

Iago gave an empathic shudder. "Wish I was." He cleared his throat and said in a perfect replica of Jafar's voice, drunken slur intact, " _Have you seen her, Iago? That figure… Like a perfect hourglass. Reminds me of the sands of time. Have I ever told you how much I love the sands of time_?"

"That's… helpful, Iago. Really. I think that's all I need to know."

"Then he'd start hugging his sands-of-time hourglass and calling it Jasmine. It was really kind of creepy."

"Iago, for real now. This isn't going to help me win a drinking contest against Razoul."

Iago kept going, his eyes glazed and one of them twitching. "And then… he would bring out the whip…"

Aladdin was out of the room in a second flat.

* * *

"I'm sorry, my boy, but there's really nothing I can tell you," the Sultan said cheerfully from where he was balancing tiny mechanical llamas on the armrests of his throne. "I haven't drank in years. Terrible experience, that."

Aladdin's expression fell. "Really? Nothing?"

"Oh, quite, yes." The Sultan stared off into space for a moment and then exclaimed, "Ah! It was nineteen years ago, give or take a few months. Jasmine's mother and I, you see, had just met, or rather we had met the previous day and that day I had just given her the flower I had plucked out of that dreadful Arbutus's living garden and she loved it. We had a little too much of the spirits, and… well." He gave a little cough and returned his attention to the llamas.

Deductive reasoning not being one of his strongest points, Aladdin asked, "Well, what?"

"Well, I daresay that was when Jasmine's mother… became Jasmine's mother."

Aladdin gave a small _ah_ and stood there awkwardly for a minute before he gave a jerky half-bow and then walked away, trying not to think about the implications too much.

The Sultan went cheerily back to his toys.

* * *

"I'm sure you've had to deal with this situation at least once," Aladdin said. "Just because you're not human doesn't mean you don't like a good drink once in a while, too. Any advice at all?"

"Al," Genie said, "you don't talk to a man while he's in the zone."

"Oh. Sorry."

Since Genie was apparently incapable of displaying the delicacy required to play croquet, he and Carpet had switched to playing baseball. Carpet would pitch, and Genie would slam the ball as far as he could, preferably in a direction that didn't involve it hitting or smashing through anything. They would trade off and Carpet would hit a ball, and then they would see how far both of them had hit their respective shots.

This was an excellent theory. The problem was that Genie couldn't hit a baseball to save his life.

Carpet reared back and chucked the ball surprisingly hard for a rug. Genie took a wild swing that sailed straight past the ball and twisted him around into a tangled mass of limbs.

The ball thudded against the wall behind him and joined the pile of four hundred and ninety-two other balls that he had conjured for Carpet to throw and thus far failed to hit.

"Wait wait wait!" Genie exclaimed. "Four hundred and ninety-fourth time's the charm, y'know."

Carpet shook its head and held out a tassel for Genie to conjure another ball in.

"So, Genie? The drinking contest?" Aladdin asked, not willing to be discouraged.

"Can't help you, Al. Genies don't really do the whole drinking scene." Swing and a four hundred and ninety-fourth miss. "We had other ways to entertain ourselves. Good, clean ways that didn't involve getting drunk."

Aladdin sighed. "Such as?"

"Hashish." Four hundred and ninety-fifth miss.

"What, really? You took hashish when you were younger?"

Genie's head twisted itself around backwards to face Aladdin. "Does this look like the face of a guy who had a completely normal childhood to you, Al?"

Aladdin winced. It made a frightening amount of sense, actually, but also went into areas of Genie's past that he really felt no desire to know about. "Well, can't you do something to help me win? Something magical?"

"I don't do the wine-into-water stuff," Genie protested. "That'd be reverse-engineering a copyright."

"What?"

"Never mind. Point is, I'm not going to help you cheat. You got yourself into this, you need to get yourself out."

"But it's not even fair! Razoul picked a contest that I can't possibly win!"

Genie heaved a sigh and missed for the four hundred and ninety-sixth time. "Well, look, Al. Here's what I'll do. If you promise not to do anything stupid like this again – and I mean _ever again_ – I'll magic your tolerance up to be even with Razoul's. That way it'll at least be an even playing field."

Aladdin immediately brightened. "Really? Thanks, Genie! I'll actually have a chance now!"

"Hey, that's what semi-phenomenal, nearly-cosmic powers are for, right?" Genie exclaimed with a grin. He dropped the bat and cracked his knuckles. "Now hold still. I've never magicked body chemistry before. If your skin starts changing color we'll know I did something wrong."

A whole lot of second thoughts occurred to Aladdin all at once, and he opened his mouth to tell Genie to hold on. Genie, of course, took this as an opportunity to send a beer-colored jolt of magic straight down Aladdin's throat. The young man choked, gave a hiccup, and then fell over.

Genie prodded him with a curly-toed shoe. Aladdin's eyes cleared and he got up. "Wow. That was… weird."

"I'll bet," Genie laughed. "Funny story, we tried the same thing with the master of a friend of mine who wanted to be able to out-smoke a rival of his."

"What happened to him?"

"Exploded. Have fun tonight, Al!"

* * *

That evening, Aladdin arrived in the royal garden again. Razoul was waiting for him with two massive kegs, one of them distinctly different from the other.

"What _is_ that?" Aladdin asked.

"Agrabanian ale," Razoul declared proudly. "Finest alcohol you'll find anywhere in the seven deserts. This keg –" he motioned to the keg that he had decorated with a pink floral design – "is for you, street rat."

"Very funny. Can we get on with it?"

They seated themselves opposite one another at a table and filled their goblets with the first ale of the night. "The rules are simple," Razoul said. "You drink a cup, I drink a cup. Over and over. First one to pass out or start vomiting loses."

"You're on," Aladdin exclaimed. They touched their goblets in a toast and downed them.

* * *

From the balcony outside her room, Jasmine watched the drinking contest begin. With her were Abu, Iago, Genie, and Carpet, all of whom were intensely interested in the outcome of the match.

"Ten denari says the kid passes out by the ninth round," Iago said out of the corner of his mouth to Abu, who shot the parrot a foul look and chattered something contrary.

Small hints of worry creased Jasmine's brow, but she remained silent and watched the two men go at it in the garden below. Genie, perceptive despite his somewhat scatterbrained nature, said in an unnecessarily low voice, "Don't worry. Al's got a fighting chance. We made sure of that earlier."

She looked at him and asked, "What do you mean?"

"I magicked Al's tolerance up to Razoul's level. Or…" and at this Genie scratched his head, "what I _thought_ Razoul's level was. Maybe I should have checked."

Jasmine said, somewhat crossly, "So you messed with Aladdin's body to help him win a stupid drinking contest, and the result is that now instead of having no tolerance nobody knows what amount of tolerance he could or could not have."

Genie grinned somewhat sheepishly. "Pretty much, yeah."

* * *

As a matter of fact, Razoul's level of tolerance was extraordinarily high. Genie had set Aladdin's level of tolerance to incredibly high. Depending upon who one asks, extraordinary could be much higher than incredible, or it could rank just below it, or there could be a much larger discrepancy in either direction.

However, if one asked Aladdin and Razoul, both of them would say that, apparently, there was absolutely no difference.

* * *

"You got some guts, street rat," Razoul said, getting another goblet's worth of ale, his speech only a bit slurred. "Serious guts. I thought you'd be out cold by now."

Aladdin grinned, though it was less confident and wavered more than usual. "You don't know that much about me, Razoul. Shouldn't make assumptions. Just makes an… just makes…" He trailed off, trying to remember what it was he was talking about, then shrugged and took another drink of ale.

Razoul shrugged and did the same.

* * *

It was at precisely this point that three very unlikely things happened, and, in an even more unlikely coincidence, they happened all at once.

To be precise, Mechanicles showed up in a giant fire-breathing flying bug-aircraft, Mozenrath advanced on the city gates with an army of undead Mamluks, _and_ the Odiferans massed in the east started flinging giant projectiles made of bad cheese at the city. This time, the imps had made them sign a nondisclosure agreement stating that the Odiferans would not at any time tell the Agrabanians that the imps had convinced them in any way, shape, or form, to go to war with the city again. Nefir learned from past mistakes.

From their position on the balcony, Jasmine, Abu, Iago, Genie, and Carpet could see all of these things at once, simultaneously. Genie spontaneously transformed into a giant glass dome to protect them from a particularly well-aimed piece of cheese, making a face when it splattered wetly all over him.

"Oh, wow," Iago muttered. "What a time for this to happen."

"We have to tell Al!" Genie exclaimed, turning one of his hands into a nozzle and then hosing himself down.

"I don't think Aladdin is in any condition to do anything about this," Jasmine said, her mouth twitching into a half-smile despite the gravity of the situation. "Look."

All of them looked down at Aladdin and Razoul to see that the two men were staggering around drunkenly… and on top of that, they were managing to do it while sitting down.

"Sitting drunk staggering," Iago observed. "Yep. They're so far gone they're gonna need passports."

"We can't sit back and do nothing," Jasmine said. "Let's split up. I'll lead the guard to the city gates and hold off Mozenrath and his Mamluks. Genie, take care of Mechanicles before he sets the city on fire. Iago and Abu, go and convince the Odiferans that whatever their grievance is, it's the imps' fault."

"What? You expect us to go and talk to those disgusting barbarians?" Iago squawked.

"You could go and try to reason with Mozenrath instead," Jasmine told him sweetly.

"Have fun with that creep, Princess!" Iago said, halfway into the air and carrying Abu by his vest. "We'll go and reason with those delightful barbarians for you. Ta!"

Jasmine watched them go and then turned to Carpet, who was looking, for a rug, very expectant. "Sorry, Carpet, but I need you to stay here and watch Aladdin and Razoul. If any enemies reach the palace walls I need you to get them to safety. And…" She leaned in a bit closer and whispered, "Make sure they don't end up in bed together. I know, it sounds ridiculous, but being drunk can make you do some very strange things."

Carpet nodded vigorously, though whether it was in response to its assignment or Jasmine's observation she couldn't say, and took off over the edge of the balcony to land in the garden below.

* * *

"I'm tellin' ya, shtreet rat," Razoul mumbled. "You shurprise me. I thought you'd be passhed out by _now_."

Aladdin, looking in no better shape than Razoul, tried to laugh cockily and instead ended up giving a massive belch. Both men looked at one another and then burst into laughter, sides heaving and tears streaming from their eyes. Razoul pounded the table so hard that he snapped it in half, which made them laugh even harder.

"Thish ish the mosht fun I've had in agesh," Razoul finally managed to get out. "But we shtill have to finish the contesht."

"Would be shtupid not to," Aladdin agreed in the deep, philosophical kind of tone that only comes when one is extremely drunk. "Y'know, Razoul, you're all right. I jusht… with the authority thing…"

"I don't hate you," Razoul admitted. "The truth ish? I ushed to be a shtreet rat, myself. I'm jusht sho hard on you becaushe you represhent erry – erev – arer –" he stopped struggling with the word and switched to a different one – "all the thingsh I want to forget about my younger daysh."

Aladdin swiped at his eyes, got up, and stumbled into a hug with Razoul. "I love you, man."

Carpet watched from the bushes with no small amount of consternation. Jasmine's claims suddenly didn't seem quite so ridiculous.

* * *

The royal guardsmen, without Razoul to rally them, had been running around like chickens with their heads cut off. Jasmine took command and led them all to the city gates, which were being besieged by a megalomaniac with an army of badly-stitched undead zombies with blue skin.

Jasmine got atop the gates and shouted, "Mozenrath, why don't you just get over the fact that you're never going to conquer Agrabah?"

"Princess, when are you going to get it through your head that I live alone in a massive palace with nobody but zombies and this annoying, brown-nosing eel for company?" Mozenrath yelled back. "I have literally nothing else to do!"

"Get a hobby!"

"Like _what_?"

"I don't know! Gardening! Grow some plants!"

Mozenrath scowled at Jasmine. He wasn't just irritated that she was ordering him around; he was irritated because she had a point and because gardening sounded really interesting.

"Do the plants come in man-eating varieties?" he shouted.

"You already have some of those! I'm talking about a nice garden with roses and petunias and maybe a cherry tree for the spring!"

"I don't know!"

Jasmine gave an exasperated sigh. "Maybe become a cook! Grow some vegetables and then use them in your recipes!"

That was interesting. "You really think I could do that? Both at once?"

"You've managed to be power-hungry and self-absorbed simultaneously for years now! You can obviously multitask!"

Mozenrath pensively stroked his chin, then realized a goatee would be make the motion much less pretentious. "Well. I guess you have a point. Should I grow a goatee, too?"

Jasmine rolled her eyes. "Sure, why not!"

The young sorcerer nodded. "Sounds fun. I'll get right on that… _after I conquer your city!_ " He indulged in a minute of evil laughter as a reward for faking out the princess so thoroughly, during which Jasmine grabbed a conveniently placed quarterstaff and chucked it at him javelin-style. It hit him square in the forehead and knocked him out.

At about that time, the Mamluks in the front came to an agreement that the pay they were receiving (none) definitely wasn't worth this, and that they needed a union. They all waved goodbye to the royal guards atop the gate and trudged off, dragging Mozenrath behind them by his cape.

* * *

"Sho I'd like to know where," Aladdin said, "you got the noshion…"

"Shaid I'd like to know where," Razoul chimed, "you got the noshion…"

They both boomed out a wavering chorus of "TO ROCK THE BOAT, DON'T ROCK THE BOAT BABY!"

"Rock the boat!"

"Don't tip the boat over!"

"ROCK THE BOAT!"

"Don't rock the boat baby!"

"ROCK THE BOAAAAAAAAAAAT!"

If Carpet had had ears, it would have covered them.

* * *

Genie eyed the fire-breathing insectoid war machine aircraft that Mechanicles was piloting. It beat its wings furiously to keep itself aloft, its fanged mouth spitting random jets of flame that turned sand to glass.

The cockpit popped open and Mechanicles shouted at Genie from inside, "Foolish Genie! I, Mechanicles, the greatest of the great Greek geniuses, have perfected this automaton to the point of invincibility! You cannot possibly defeat me!"

Genie made a point of not telling anyone this, but he had at one point met Archimedes. The man had sunk an entire invading fleet with nothing more than the sun and an impressive array of bronze mirrors. It was highly improbable that Mechanicles was the greatest of the great Greek geniuses, or that he was even Greek, for that matter.

"Really?" Genie asked. "It's really, really impossible for me to defeat you?"

"Yes!"

"I should just get out of your way and let you torch the city, right?"

"Indubitably!"

"With that flying machine."

"Quite!"

"The flying machine that flies by beating its wings."

"Yes!" Mechanicles shouted, getting a bit impatient by this point. Normally, Aladdin would have started making a nuisance of himself the moment Mechanicles had announced how undefeatable he was; this was a new tactic.

"How's that work?"

"You expect me to reveal the secret inner workings of my beautiful device to a buffoon like you? Ridiculous! Move aside or be crisped to a bit!"

"I'm just saying!" Genie protested. "What's that thing weigh?" He materialized a scale beneath it. The scale's needle went from zero to _too much to be supported by a pair of flimsy metal beating wings_ in a split second, and Genie pointed at the reading with a grin.

Mechanicles looked at the scale, looked at Genie, and then looked at the ground.

The scale disappeared and his craft plummeted like a stone.

Genie waved goodbye and merrily headed back to Agrabah. Just because he defied all conventions of logic didn't mean that everyone else was free to do so as well.

After all, that would leave the world open for all kinds of anachronistic and temporal inaccuracies.

* * *

"I shink," Razoul said, "that the only reashon we hate… is becaush we're afraid to love."

Aladdin nodded. "Totally. Totally. I am sho wif you on that."

"And the meaning of life?" the now-very-drunk guardsman laughed. "It'sh sho shimple! Life ish what you make of it!"

"Deeeeeeep!" Aladdin breathed. He tried to take another swallow of ale and succeeded in dumping most of it down his front. The two men looked at each other and started laughing again.

Carpet made a note of this new revelation. Life was what you made of it. So that was what humans, adorable as they were, deluded themselves into thinking the meaning of life was. He vastly preferred his own motto: things without thread just wound up dead.

* * *

Prince Uncouthma was sitting forlornly in his tent, listening to the sound of the cheese firings, when a pair of small figures crept inside and said, "We need to talk to you!"

Rather, one said that. The other one chattered something unintelligible and jumped up and down.

The ruler of Odiferous looked at the parrot and the monkey that had somehow gotten into his tent. "Foe Iago and Foe Abu!" he exclaimed. "How did you get past my sentries?"

"Your sentries were scarecrows made of cheese," Iago said. "All of your men are busy firing the catapults."

"Budget cutbacks," Uncouthma sighed. "Anyway, leave or I will have to smash you! We are at war!"

"Why?" Iago asked.

This made Uncouthma hesitate a bit. He didn't know specifically how to tell Iago without violating the NDA the imps had made him sign, so he said, "Because!"

Iago exchanged a glance with Abu, rolled his eyes, and said, "The imps are behind this, aren't they?"

Uncouthma stared. "You are truly wise, Foe Iago! How did you discern this?" There wasn't any point in keeping to the NDA after the secret was out, he supposed.

"Because they were behind it the last two times you declared war on us," Iago replied. "The first time, they convinced you we stole your most sacred crock of cheese when Nefir really had it under his hat. The second time, they just told you that we said you guys looked like dorks."

"That was a very hurtful lie of theirs to tell," Uncouthma reminisced.

"Must have been. What's the reason this time?"

Uncouthma made sure no imps were about and then leaned forward conspiratorially. "They told us that not only did you steal our most sacred crock of cheese, you also left a note where it should have been calling us dorks."

Iago made a shocked face. "The double-whammy! I'm surprised you didn't declare war sooner!"

"I did not want to. General Gouda was the one who made the deal with Nefir." Uncouthma paused for a moment and then added, "And he signed the NDA for all of us and didn't tell us until afterwards."

"Good grief. You should see about getting him removed from his position."

"So is what the imps said true, Foe Iago?"

Iago sighed. "I'm afraid not. Your sacred crock of cheese really is tempting and all, but we didn't take it. Has Nefir taken to wearing a really, really big hat, the kind you could hide a sacred crock of cheese in?"

"Yes."

"Check under there. As for the note, whose handwriting was it in?"

Uncouthma strained his brain-muscle. He thought about the note, and then thought about the contract that Nefir wrote and had Gouda sign.

"Nefir's."

"I think it's safe to say that he wrote the note."

"This makes sense, Friend Iago!" Uncouthma laughed. "We no longer have to be at war! Hooray!" He delivered a spine-crushing hug to both Iago and Abu and charged out of his tent, yelling for his men to stop firing the catapults and to find Nefir.

Iago managed to get back to his feet and smoothed his ruffled feathers. "What a charmer."

* * *

The disparate members of the party arrived back at the Palace at about the same time, the three separate crises averted and Agrabah saved again.

Carpet met them at the front gate. Jasmine immediately asked, "How are they, Carpet?" The rug pointed around the side of the castle and they all followed it back into the royal garden. There were Aladdin and Razoul, sound asleep on the grass in the midst of a shattered table and lying next to a pair of empty kegs, one of them decorated with a very pretty pink floral design.

Iago took one look and announced, "And just when I thought I'd seen everything that could make me lose my lunch, I have to add Aladdin and Razoul spooning to the list."

* * *

Genie closed Carpet's diary, trying to forget the ode to Jasmine's throw rug that he had had the misfortune of stumbling across, and handed it back to the rug. "And that's when we found you guys."

One of Aladdin's eyes twitched. "So both Razoul and I lost."

"Yup. You're going to have to call him Captain and admit you were wrong, and he's not going to be able to call you street rat anymore and he'll have to take orders from you."

"And on top of that, both of us were entirely useless during the 'crucial moment' he was so adamant about being prepared for."

"Useless, and hilariously drunk, if rug-man's diary can be believed."

Aladdin slouched even more in his seat and covered his eyes with his hands. "I'm never going to drink again."


End file.
